


His Protector

by storyplease



Category: Original Work
Genre: Brother and sister angst, Family, Gen, Protecting Your Loved Ones, church grim
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-28
Updated: 2018-02-28
Packaged: 2019-03-25 02:41:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13824765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storyplease/pseuds/storyplease
Summary: From the moment her younger brother was born, she knew she would be his protector, even after death.





	His Protector

**Author's Note:**

> This story popped into my head and I couldn't rest until I finished it for better or worse. I'd love to know what you think of it.

**The Protector**

She is four with her hair pulled so tightly into fluffy puffballs that her eyes feel all squinty when her baby brother Elliot is born.  Her mama lets her hold him in her lap and her eyes sparkle when she smells his soft, sweet baby scent.  She takes one look at his wide brown nose and his delicate eyelashes as he sleeps wrapped up tightly in the yellow receiving blanket, and she knows that he is  _ hers _ and that she will be his protector.

 

“You’re a good big sis,” her mother says, stroking her cheek, and just like that, it has always been true.

 

She is protective of Elliot; staying nearby when he is toddling on unsteady legs. She changes more than a few diapers, which she knows she’ll tease him about when he is older, albeit goodnaturedly. She feeds him while her mama is putting up her swollen feet on a chair after a hard day working at the hotel as a cleaning lady.  Her mama used to paint when she was younger, but now her body is far too heavy with exhaustion.

 

Her daddy will be away for another month at least in his truck, and she loves pretending to drive one of her brother’s toy trucks across the old map that lies on the desk in the library.  Before he started driving big-rigs, her daddy was a scholar, but books don’t feed a family, and so he has made do with his lot in life.  She knows that it has to do with the color of his skin, that it is similar to the reason why her doll has blue eyes and long black hair and fair skin that is nothing like hers, but while she knows the taste of this  _ wrongness _ , she still doesn’t know how to explain it to Elliot.

 

They are lucky to live in a place that is not as dangerous as it could be, but it is not as safe as it could be, as the students she sees in class with their shiny binders and bright smiles and mothers in designer dresses dropping them off in nice cars. While she knows that her family loves her, she and her brother must fend for themselves most days due to their mother’s long hours and their father’s absence. 

 

When her daddy returns home in the summer, the days are magical.  They stretch out in trips to the museum, a long car trip to see a historical monument, weekly jaunts to the library, and stuff their faces with toasted marshmallows in their tiny backyard.  She tells him what she’s learned and he gives her a notebook filled with a story he’s written— one about a girl just like her, who finds a door in the back of her closet and has magical adventures in another world far away.

 

She reads it so many times that she has it memorized by the time he comes home again for Christmas.

 

Years pass and Elliot grows up under the watchful eye of his protective sister.  At sixteen, she’s broad-shouldered and strong like her father, her grin wide and toothy like her mother’s, and her eyes hold secrets that are all her own.  She’s not particularly tall, but she’s stocky and solid, and she can outrun many of the boys when she puts her mind to it.  Elliot is spindly and tall, like an overly ambitious sapling, his narrow shoulders and hips giving him a dancer’s appearance, and he is never without a book in his arms.  His ears stick out on both sides of his clean shaven head, which earns him all manner of unkind nicknames that his sister feels is necessary to beat out of his bullies.  It is only her gender that keeps her from being outed by the shame-faced, black-eyed boys in Elliott's class, for they cannot bear to tell their teachers that they were beaten by a girl and a dark-skinned girl at that.

 

Elliot scolds her for resorting to violence, but he love his sister, loves how strong and big her heart is when it comes to the ones she loves.  He sometimes snaps at her, annoyed about her protectiveness, but he always sleeps easily at night with the knowledge that she will always watch over him.

 

The bullies back off, and for awhile, all is as well as it can be.  Still, there are moments that show through the easy smiles and the kisses goodnight and the grades that make her parents beam with pride.  Their mama’s swollen ankles constantly hurt her no matter how much she ices and elevates them, now. Their father’s voice is mostly known through pay phones with lines that crackle and hiss as though to accentuate the distance between him and his family.  There have been cuts to his hours and his pay, now, and he must make up the difference by working longer hours and taking odd shipments at the last minute.

 

She also has forgotten that bullies might have older siblings of their own.

 

One day, when she walks to Elliot’s school to pick him up, he is not standing by the yellow pole where he normally waits for her. Her nerves prickle, red and hot, and she knows at once that something is terribly wrong.  

 

Elliot is on the ground behind the gymnasium holding his belly tightly, his face scrunched up in a grimace of pain.  There is blood on his forehead. His glasses lie cracked on the asphalt. Two boys are jumping on his pencil box, the one that their father brought back from a trip through Amish country.  They’ve already trashed his backpack and have thrown the majority of his books into the nearby dumpster.  She makes a noise between a howl of rage and a snarl of fury and something about it is so inhuman that it makes them pause in their abuse of her precious brother.  

 

She rushes towards them, landing a fist in the center of one boy’s stomach. He makes a surprised whooshing sound before crumpling to the ground with a thud.  The other boy grabs a bat and tries to hit her with it, but she’s too fast and gets too close too quickly and he can’t swing hard. She takes the brunt of his shortened swing on her shoulder and doesn’t stop, slamming him against the brick wall until he drops the bat and is on the ground whimpering.

 

Another boy comes up behind her and grabs her by her hair and she turns, her teeth bared as she grabs his wrist and squeezes the bones in a painful manner that makes his fingers release her.  She twists his arm and pulls him around in a circle, then lets go of him. His mouth is frozen in an “o” of surprise as he slides across the gravelly ground and comes to rest next to the dumpster.

 

“Elliot!” She turns and runs for her brother, getting down on her knees and checking him for serious wounds. 

 

“I’m...I’m fine, sis,” he says weakly.

 

“Don’t scare me like that,” she says, hugging him. “Now, come on. We need to get you home and bandaged up before Mama sees you and beats your ass a second time.”

 

“She’s gonna be mad when she sees my glasses got broke,” he replies with a sniffle.

 

“She’s gonna be glad that her son is safe,” she replies sternly. “Now you go on and get washed up in the bathroom. I’m gonna get your books and stuff together.”

 

“Are you sure?” Elliot looks at the three boys groaning on the ground. 

 

“Does this face look unsure?” she asks back, giving him her best Stern Mama impression.

 

“No,” he says, cracking a small smile.

 

“Then get,” she says, standing up and helping him to his feet.

 

“Ok,” he says, brushing himself off, “I know I don’t always say it but...I love you, sis, you know that, right?”

 

“Stop being so mushy, baby bro, or I’m going to turn ten shades of red,” she replies with a grin of her own, and hands him his cracked glasses.

 

He puts them on and walks gingerly back into the light.

 

“Hey,” says a new, deeper voice, and then she hears the ugly word that she’s seen scrawled on walls and shouted by boys with swastika tattoos.

 

She turns, tries to react, but all she can see is a pale, clean-shaven head, a sinister grin, and the glint of the aluminum bat as it flies through the air towards her face.

 

A burst of pain blots out her vision.

 

And then, darkness.

She wakes up.

Unfamiliar trees stretch their limbs above her.  The scent in the air tells her that rain is coming.  She sits on the hill, overlooking the city, not quite sure how she’s come to be here but also knowing that she must stay and wait.

 

Wait...for someone?

 

She tries to remember his name, but it is fuzzy and insubstantial, like a photograph left out in a rainstorm. She remembers glasses, the sound of his voice, the way he clicks his tongue when he is trying to concentrate.

 

She  _ cannot _ remember.

 

She  _ wants _ to remember.

 

People visit the hill from time to time, but she does not think to ask them.  She knows that she must figure it out in her own head like a puzzle that simply needs to be rearranged in the proper configuration.  She walks along the rows of marble and prowls down the side of the fences, keeping out the Things that lurk past the tree line and running out anyone who enters her domain with bad intentions.  

 

She finds that she is quite good at this and often wonders how this came to be.

 

One day, she smells a familiar smell, and dashes towards it, her claws clicking against the stone as she finds purchase. She stops feet away from a young man. He is tall, his shoulders broad in a familiar way, and she thinks  _ brother _ though she knows that she is no longer human, and sometimes wonders if she ever was.

 

His glasses are rectangular and his hair is braided and tied into a messy ponytail.  His smile is sad.

 

“I got into the first college of my choice as photography major,” he says to the marble slab before him.  “I’m going to miss you, you know.”

 

She lets out a bark of laughter, for she knows the marble will not respond, but then again something tells her that it is not the marble that he is speaking to.

 

His head turns, then, and he looks at her, his eyes widening.  She, too, is surprised, for she is only used to Bad Things being able to see her.  This boy, though, who is nearly a man but not quite— he is the furthest thing from Bad she’s ever seen.

 

“Izzy?” he says, softly, and her ears perk. She pads over to him and sits at his feet, her eyes nearly level with his chest due to her massive size.

 

“Wuf,” she says,  _ I know you, don’t I? _

 

And then he is throwing his arms around her black, shaggy fur and she can feel his hot tears staining her coat as he cries long and loud and whispers “Izzy, Izzy, Izzy,” and she lets him do all of these things without a sound.  She wags her tail, and she can feel the memories grow clearer every time he says her name.

 

When his tears are spent, he sits next to her on the hill and tells her what happened after her death, that their father had moved home for good and taken job at the local university after the tragedy came to light in the media and someone put in a good word for him.  That their mother no longer had to work at the hotel, but instead made handmade quilts and sold them for a good price.  That the money from the court case against the rich family whose son had murdered her had paid for him to go to a private school with a gifted program.  That he would be able to go to college.

 

That he has a little brother of his own, born two years after her death. 

 

“His name is Isaac,” Elliot explains. “I know you’d love him just as much if not more than you loved me. He’s got your same smile. I’m his protector just like you were for me.”

 

As the sun begins to set, she nudges his hand and when he stands, she stands too, her tail wagging tentatively.

 

“I’m gonna miss you, Izz,” he says sadly.

 

She barks back, as if to say  _ but I’m right here! _

 

“Don’t worry ‘bout us,” he continues. “You can move on, you know.  Don’ be stubborn, now. You were always too stubborn for your own good.”

 

She whines softly, her ears tucked down against her head.

 

“You don’t have to protect me any longer,” he says, his voice breaking slightly. “I’m gonna be ok.”

 

She nudges his hand with her head, looking up at him pleadingly. All she’s ever wanted for all this time is to be with him again. He wraps his arms around her body again, squeezing her tight.

 

“It’s ok, Izz,” he says, “You can let go.”

 

She feels herself fading, then, her body growing insubstantial, and she thinks  _ no, not yet, surely it is far too soon _ , but then there is a burst of warmth and light and she is gone, and the boy who is nearly a man is standing alone in a graveyard far below her.  

 

He stands in silence for a long time, watching the stars reveal themselves in the inky sky above him. Then, he turns and walks slowly down the hill towards a home to which she can never return.


End file.
